Seminar plus other news and reviews

So it’s been way too long since I’ve updated this thing.  First off, let me announce that this coming Saturday, October 2nd, we will be teaching a seminar at the University of Mary Washington on the basics of Historical Combat in the Liechtenaur tradition.  We will be focusing on stance, balance, movement, and basic strikes, throws, and locks, keeping with the concept that “All fencing comes from wrestling”.  This way students will have at least a basic foundation in grappling before moving onto sword-work in future seminars, as well as have the opportunity to practice footwork and learn the concept of “fuhlen” without having to worry about a sword in the hand.

In other news, over the summer we’ve begun to take a look at British broadsword traditions in addition to our studies in the Liechtenaur tradition.  At the moment we haven’t yet really focused on one master, mixing in lessons from George Silver, Thomas Page, Zachary Wylde, and some later 18th century military broadsword/cavalry saber.  We’re using the military manual of LeMarchant  (http://www.careyroots.com/broadsword.html) as a starting point, as it’s a fairly simple system to learn and drill (being intended for training large numbers of troops to work together, and less focused on individual sword-play and tactics).  However, we plan on moving to one of the more in-depth systems for advanced practice – I’m not liking Wylde’s presentation, so I’m thinking Page or Silver (we may one day do both, but I wish to focus on one or the other for a time).

Lastly, over the summer I aquired the new Hanwei Practical German Bastard Sword (http://www.kultofathena.com/product.asp?item=SH2428&name=Hanwei+Practical+Bastard+Sword) for use as a training blunt.  I have to say, for the price, I really think Hanwei did a great job with this.  There’s the usual relatively poor quality of the leather grip wrap (every grip I’ve seen that’s seen any real use eventually has had the stitching coming apart – I personally remove the leather and wrap the grip with electrical tape when this happens).  It is a fairly big sword, over four feet long and weighing in close to four pounds, but it is well balanced and proportioned, so it moves very well for its mass.  It also has great flexibility in the blade, definitely enough for this to be used with contact drills or controlled freeplay (although one would definitely have to be used with good control and while each person is wearing adequate protection against blows – it IS a big sword, so it will hit hard in the cut!).  The only downside with that flexibility is that it’s a little too wobbly for half-swording (and even more-so for a good mortschlag), and if you accidentally bind with the weak instead of the strong, you can sometimes get a slightly unpleasant vibration in the hand.  However, the vibration is minor (and can help tell you when you’re binding poorly), and the flexibility is not a real problem for a blade that’s primarily going to be used for blossfechten practice.  As a last comment, I have not yet had to file down the edges – they are well-rounded, and the blade seems to have quite a decent temper.  Overall, a very good value.

- Chris